Following big releases, staff usually gets axed. That appears to be the case in the laying off of about 60 from Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment. The publisher confirmed pink slips were given, but not the number.

The layoffs hit WBIE's Seattle operations, comprising the Snowblind, Monolith and Surreal studios. Snowblind developed The Lord of the Rings: War in the North, which released on Tuesday. A statement from WBIE made it sound like the layoffs were routine, which it certainly is within the industry.

"As part of the continual review of our business operations and fluctuating market conditions, we have had to make reductions in our WB Games Seattle workforce," a spokesman told Kotaku. They didn't specify what types of jobs were lost.

Among current projects at WBIE's Seattle division, Monolith is working on Gotham City Impostors.

[Correction] An earlier version of this story erroneously implied the layoffs were entirely within quality assurance staff. According to a source familiar with the reductions, they also included designers and artists.